Trigger Warning: This piece contains descriptions of child sexual abuse, grooming, and exploitation. It may be triggering for some readers. Please proceed with care.
Let’s talk about child sexual abuse.
Not the kind they warn you about.
Not the stranger in the van.
The kind that starts at home.
When it’s your parent.
Your caregiver.
The person who was supposed to love you.
The person the world tells you to trust.
You don’t recognize it as abuse.
It’s just life.
It’s the air you breathe before you even know you’re breathing.
And then you grow.
Your body changes.
You hit puberty, and everything shifts.
The world sees you differently now.
The pedophiles lose interest.
The predators evolve.
They begin to move in.
They smell vulnerability like blood.
You are no longer a child.
You are a body.
A prize.
A thing to conquer.
A thing to consume.
Others resent you for the attention.
They don’t care how young you still are.
They whisper.
They judge.
They blame you for being chosen.
They hate you for surviving.
The countdown begins long before your 18th birthday.
A pack of wolves lurks in the shadows to avoid being caged.
They patiently wait for their turn.
The moment the clock hits zero, they begin to circle you.
Salivating at the mouth,
Smelling your wounds.
They devour you until there’s nothing left.
Their hunger is protected by the law.
It’s no longer punished.
You didn’t fight back.
Your silence becomes consent.
The world that once cradled the child,
now shuns the adult with “free will.”
